


The Way I Walk

by Wintress



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Age Difference, Age Regression/De-Aging, Bucky is a little shit, Comedy, De-Aged Bucky Barnes, Flirting, Fluff, Humor, M/M, Mild Smut, Not IW compliant, Older Man/Younger Man, Steve Rogers and his Guilt Boners, Teasing, Teen Bucky, because hoo boy we're dealing with teen bucky i hope youre ready, did i mention buckys a teenager, enchantress enjoys fucking things up, everything is well and that purple grape is dead, it should be illegal to eat froot loops like that, no one can handle teenage bucky, steve does not deserve this suffering, steve is not ready, tags to be updated as fic progresses
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-15
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:08:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21755962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wintress/pseuds/Wintress
Summary: "Sorry lady, you've picked the wrong planet. Last fella who tried that got turned to dust.""Lucky I'm not a 'fella' then," she twists around and glides up close, purring in Bucky's ear. "Who's to say you wouldn't enjoy a little female domination, hmm?""Hate to break it to you sweetheart, but you're not my type." Bucky says flatly. She cocks her head, her hair swaying gently in the windless night sky."No, perhaps not," she says thoughtfully; that predatory smile begins to spread across those impossibly perfect features as she studies him closely. "Though it would seem you do have a penchant for blondes, Sergeant."Bucky learns the hard way what happens when you cross an Asguardian enchantress and live to tell the tale.Everyone in the Avengers compound learns that teenage Bucky is irresistible and fucking KNOWS it.Steve learns he has superb self-control...Until he doesn't.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 18
Kudos: 126





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [surfaces](https://archiveofourown.org/users/surfaces/gifts).

> Hellooo! First things first let's just get this out the way that this is an AU: Thanos lost in Wakanda. Everyone is fine. No one's dead. Isn't fiction wonderful?
> 
> Now that's settled, please be aware there is future smut etc and the tags will be updated to reflect this.  
Bucky is NOT being deaged to a child's age. All will be revealed. Stay tuned!

Bucky's flight home has been as smooth as silk since they set off from Wakanda; uneventful, quiet save for the Motown Sam's playing through the quinjet's sound system. So relaxing in fact that Bucky hunkered down in his sweats and dozed off in his seat before they'd even left the continent. Which is why he's grumpy as well as surprised when the jet lurches sickeningly and tosses him out of his seat, accompanied by the tell-tale supersonic _ whoomph _of something zipping by them in the air at top speed.

"What the hell!" Sam cries out, fighting to right the jet's trajectory and get them back on an even keel. Bucky growls and wiggles his pinky in his ear with a grimace.

"Whatever it is, it's popped my ears - that shit hurts -"

"There's not supposed to be anything near us, I checked our flight path before we left… Wait." Sam's finger taps the radar, showing a tiny yellow dot approaching them. "It's coming back. Buckle up, I gotta out-maneuver them, we don't have clearance to be out here."

Bucky ignores him in favour of squinting out the window, but all he can see is the night sky and heavy cloud cover. Sam brings them higher, fiddles with the controls, trying to find the cloaking mechanism as he mutters to himself about how it's too small for an aircraft_ ("Maybe a drone or some shit?") _ when a pale green glow backlights a heavy rain cloud ahead of them. Bucky leans forward over the dash, practically squashing his nose to the glass. It's following them: they emerge from the clouds, and if he hadn't become so acquainted with the diverse array of people and aliens he'd been introduced to over the past year, he wouldn't have believed his eyes.

"Sam," he says without taking his eyes off the glowing figure before them. "There's a woman in the sky."

"What -" Sam stops dead when he looks up. When he speaks after a moment, he sounds both annoyed and resigned. "Oh. Would you take a look at that, so there is."

She's stopped her rapid approach, and even from this distance it's obvious she's tall, with long limbs packed into an emerald suit that catches the scant light from the moon and glimmers like fish scales. White-blonde hair flows from an elaborate headpiece and undulates gently despite the wind that must be whipping around her at this altitude, as though she's underwater. 

"Is that - what's her name, the space woman?" Bucky asks as Sam halts the jet and sets it to hover.

"That ain't Carol. I dunno who she is, but she's not one of ours." 

She doesn't move a muscle, hanging suspended in the air metres away from them, arms afloat. Bucky feels that little niggle in his gut that means something's up, and it's never served him wrong before.

"She a friendly?"

"No idea." Sam tears his gaze away from her to search the dashboard. "If I can find the speaker system we can find out." 

"No need, I'll ask her." Bucky swivels and strides into the belly of the jet, and smacks the button to release the hatch. It slowly lowers down and the wind roars through the jet, rustling his sweats and almost drowning out Sam's yells as he scrambles to unbuckle himself from his safety harness. By the time he's free and racing to the open hatch, Bucky has already slung a rifle over his shoulder and clambered out, clinging to the safety rails on the side of the ship. When he reaches the topside he hooks his ankles around the lower rail and an elbow around another, and throws the rifle around to aim at the woman. Bucky spits out a stray lock of dark hair the howling gale has blown into his mouth and calls out.

"Hey!" The wind whips away his words, but there's no doubt the woman's heard him. She glances around and coquettishly gestures to her chest at the same time words enter his head in a whispery drawl. 

_ Who, me? _

Bucky yelps, almost losing his grip. He can see Sam waving his hands from the skylight, face furious and scared. Bucky flashes him a thumbs up and when he gets the middle finger and more muted yelling in return he turns back to the woman, who has started to drift closer. All at once the wind drops and they're ensconced in a bubble of eerie silence; his ears ring with the sudden absence of roaring wind and he doesn't take his rifle sights off her head.

"That's better, don't you think? Now I know you can hear me." She sighs, brushing a lock of silver from her face. Her glow bounces off the skylight and obscures Sam, glints off the end of his gun. She's like a little sun, Bucky thinks to himself. A sun-mermaid. Is that even possible? He fought beside a tree and a talking raccoon less than six months ago so he doesn't doubt for a moment that she very well could be. Stranger things have happened. 

Like hanging off the side of a jet to talk to a telepathic sun-mermaid thousands of feet in the air.

"Heard you just fine. I don't do well with people putting things in my head, if it's all the same to you." She floats closer, and her soft smile stretches into a grin that shows too many teeth. No, not a mermaid, Bucky thinks - she's more like an angler fish, and he's just fallen for the bait. He stiffens and adjusts his rifle before warning, "Don't come any closer. I mean it."

"Oh, I know you do." She taps the side of her head.

Bucky rolls his eyes; just what he needs, another mind reader. "What do you want?"

The woman floats and twists lazily in the air, resting her head on her hands as she dons an innocent, wistful expression. Bucky keeps the rifle's sights on her as she drifts around him.

"Oh, I don't know. Universal adoration, subjugation of all men, planetary domination... the usual."

"Sorry lady, you've picked the wrong planet. Last fella who tried that got turned to dust."

"Lucky I'm not a 'fella' then," she twists around and glides up close, purring in Bucky's ear. "Who's to say you wouldn't enjoy a little female domination, hmm?"

"Hate to break it to you sweetheart, but you're not my type." Bucky says flatly. She cocks her head, her hair swaying gently in the windless night sky.

"No, perhaps not," she says thoughtfully; that predatory smile begins to spread across those impossibly perfect features as she studies him closely. "Though it would seem you _ do _have a penchant for blondes, Sergeant."

Bucky feels a shock of cold dread thrill through him at the realisation she was sifting through his mind once more. He snaps his rifle closer and narrows his eyes.

"Pretty sure I just told you to stay out of my mind." He can hear faint clanging and banging in the jet beneath him - hopefully Sam is rustling up a Plan B in the form of laser guns or whatever shit is hidden in this plane. Bucky reasons to himself that it has a cloaking device, ergo laser guns are par for the course. Right? "I don't care who you think you are, but we've kind of had our fill of freaky aliens trying to take over. You might wanna leave before we put a hole through that pretty catsuit of yours and blast you out of the sky."

"Oh, you noticed?" She preens, running her hands up and down her curves. "It's couture."

"Could be made out of diamante megalodon hide for all I give a fuck. I told you to leave, now _ leave _." Bucky mentally wills Sam to hurry up; she's toying with them, like a cat with a helpless mouse, and it's only so long before she gets bored and disembowels them to leave on someone's doorstep.

"So impatient, so brash." The woman gestures dismissively with a delicate hand, but Bucky doesn't miss the flash of annoyance in her eyes. "And my aura has no effect on you. If it were your friend up here, I'd have him singing love songs while he cartwheels off the side of your vessel in five seconds flat. Pity, really. We could have had such fun."

"I'm devastated." Bucky deadpans. He can hear something whirring to life within the jet. If he can just keep her talking, distract her until Sam boots up whatever machine will knock this crazy bitch out of the air, they can be on their merry way. "Anything else to add before we get going? We're kind of in a hurry here."

"That's right! Your captain is at home waiting for you, isn't he?" She loops around him again, closer this time, and he bristles with anger.

"I told you to stay out of my fucking head, lady. Last warning." Bucky tracks her floating form and feels deep clicks and whines from inside the ship. Just a little longer...if his temper doesn't break first.

"My aura might not work on you, but I could turn it around… mould and massage your little mind until it's as pliable as soft clay, bend you to my whims and wills. Have my way." Her voice drops to dangerous, velvety registers as she loops up and around him. Closer and closer, until her hair fans around Bucky and tickles his ears. The worst thing is he knows she's not lying - he can feel faint carressing in the corners of his subconscious, so unlike the stab of white-hot pain from being wiped and the cold blanket of the words that would rip all control and independent thought from him. 

Yet, in a way, it's no different from them at all. Still an unwanted presence in his head, still a threat to his free will. Bucky has come too fucking far to let some weird cloud mermaid rip it all away again. 

She draws a freezing cold finger up the side of his neck, to where his jaw is ticking in contained ire, and she whispers in his ear. "I could have you do anything I want, and there's not a thing you could do to stop me… _ James _."

His temper is much closer to the surface these days, and unfortunately for them all it snaps. 

"Right. We're done here." He growls

He can hear the latch to the skylight popping open and the unmistakable rattle of a turret-mounted machine gun being drawn and aimed, but as soon as Sam yells _ "Barnes, duck!" _, Bucky headbutts the woman and her head snaps back with a high shriek and a stream of blood arcing in the sky. It almost looks black in the night air.

"I warned you!" Bucky snarls, ready to draw fire - but he's stopped short when her hand shoots up to grip the muzzle, bending it as though it were a plastic straw. When her head rolls back up from her shoulders and she glares down at him through a blood-spattered mask, her face is contorted in fury.

"And I warned _ you _." She raises her hand at the same time Sam shoots. There's a blinding flash of green and white, gunfire, a scream, and the jet is hovering in silence once more.

When Sam pokes his head up to assess the damage, the wind has kicked back up and Bucky is nowhere to be seen.

"Barnes?" He calls, twisting in the skylight to search around the top of the jet. Nothing but clouds and the smattering of light rain beginning to fall. "Barnes!"

He drops down, powering down the turret gun and races towards the comms unit atop the dash. He's about to call mayday when the hatch shuts suddenly, enveloping him in silence; Sam's been so caught up in Bucky being a complete insubordinate asshole he'd forgotten to shut it.

"Bucky?" He shouts into the gloom. Dread and panic grip him: what if he'd missed that weird sky witch and shot Bucky down instead? What if it was her who'd just crawled inside the quinjet? What -

"Sam?"

Sam stops dead as a slim figure steps out of the gloom. He almost drops the comms unit and blurts out, "Oh shit."


	2. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oh hey Steve! Three words: sorry, not sorry.

Two hours later, on another jet, across another ocean, Steve Rogers almost knocks the tiny S.H.I.E.L.D. jet pilot off her seat to snatch the comms unit out of her hands.

"Sam! Sam? Repeat that, what did you just say?" He holds the ear piece uselessly up to his ear when Wilson's voice comes through the onboard speaker system; Steve had ripped the unit clean out of the console.

"Hey, calm down man. I was just checking your ETA." Sam says smoothly. 

"We're about half an hour out," Steve says. "That's not all you said. What's this about a 'situation'? Are you both okay?"

Sam mumbles something that sounds suspiciously like _ "Fuckin' super hearing, I swear-" _ before sighing. "Nothing you need to worry about right now. We had a bit of an altercation on our way back from Wakanda, but we can deal with it when you get here."

"An alterca - for Christ's sake Sam, spit it out!" Steve snaps, more stressed than angry. He doesn't miss the way Clint and the pilot draw one another looks out the corner of his eye, and he takes a deep breath. "Sorry... after everything that's been going on, I just -"

"You worry. I get it Steve, trust me. Look, it's kind of hard to explain, but I'll tell you all about it when you get here. Hell, it's probably better for you to just see for yourself. All you need to know is it's been dealt with, we're looking for the culprit, and Barnes is gonna be fine."

Steve's blood runs cold. "Bucky? What happened to him?"

"He's fine, I just told you!" There's raised voices in the background, raucous laughter, and a tell-tale snort-chuckle that Steve would recognise in his sleep; Bucky. "Listen, I gotta go, but I thought you should know we got here safe and nobody's… he's not _ hurt, _alright? Just a heads up."

"Sam, you're scaring me." Steve says flatly. 

"Would you rather I let you walk into a situation, no matter how big or small, not knowing it was coming? After the past few years? You'd let me know to stay on my toes if I was coming back to something, I'm just showing you the same courtesy." A crackle of static as Sam breathes, then, gentler: "Don't sweat it. He's okay. We're on the case"

Steve wants to argue that he can't exactly feel reassured when he doesn't know what the 'case' is, but he knows Sam will talk him around regardless. He folds his arms tight around his chest and drops his head, contrite. "Yeah, alright. See you soon, over."

"Over."

The cockpit is awkwardly silent for a few beats. Unsurprisingly, it's not one of the S.H.I.E.L.D. strike team who break it.

"Sooo… you'll be wanting us to cut that ETA by half, yeah?" Clint breezes by Steve, buckling himself in beside the tiny pilot.

Steve says nothing for a moment, anxiety roiling in his gut and burning his chest as he looks out at the clouds whipping by them in the air - not fast enough for his liking. "Yeah. Please." He says, then he's quiet for the rest of the flight.

  
  


***

He almost whacks his head off the roof of the jet because he didn't wait for the ramp to lower properly before disembarking. Steve's spent the entire journey running nightmare scenarios over and over, his mind conjuring up the worst of the worst as it jumbles through possible disasters:

_ Did something happen to his arm? What if they've discovered something that points to Thanos returning? What if there's an even bigger threat from space? Oh fuck don't tell me he's been injured - what if he's been triggered again and he's attacked someone andthey'vehurthimohmygodohfuckohno - _

The turbines are still spinning and the engine hasn't even started clicking as it cools yet, but Steve is taking huge strides across the landing strip and is already half-way to the Avengers compound. He won't run, won't make a scene or a fool of himself - but it's a very near thing when he spots a familiar figure slouched on a bench outside the back doors. Sam's brows are drawn as he tears into a bacon sandwich, ignoring the lettuce and sauce littering the napkin on his knees.

Steve opens his mouth, ready for a litany of questions to pour out, when Sam shushes him with a muffled "Ah-ah," his finger raised as he chews. 

So he waits.

And waits.

And waits until Clint's caught up with them and Steve's almost vibrating out of his skin, and then finally Sam is finished, wiping his face and beard with firm swipes of his napkin.

"I'd like to go on record," Sam mumbles around his last mouthful. "And let it be known," He sounds more grumpy than worried, which instantly confuses Steve. "That I will no longer be eating in the same room as Barnes."

That's...not exactly what Steve was expecting. "...Okay. Got it. Do you want to maybe tell me what's going on then?"

Sam gives his face one last cursory wipe and grunts as he stands, motioning for them to follow him into the compound. "Come on, I'll try to explain."

He talks as they walk through the main ground floor, past the training rooms and the hangar, going through what led up to the "glowing sky-mermaid". They're in the elevator to the third floor, where the compound's kitchen and rec rooms are based when Sam gets to the good stuff. 

"...And then she starts fucking with him, messing with his head and reading his thoughts."

"Oh no." Steve groans. 

"Oh yes. You can imagine how he reacted."

"Not well?"

"I wouldn't exactly call it an overreaction, but he ignored me trying to get him to back down so I could shoot her out of the sky. He headbutted her and broke her nose all to shit."

"He headbutted an alien?!"Steve squawks at the same time as Clint mutters, "That's so fucking cool." Steve shoots him a look and he shrugs.

"I fucking wish I'd gotten the chance to headbutt Loki. I kinda get the idea she feels the same way as him about regular old gross humans bringing her down a peg or two," Clint adds helpfully. The elevator dings brightly and they walk through the hall. Steve shakes his head to throw off the buzz of anxiety and irritation vibrating between his ears.

“And?” He doesn’t quite snap at Sam, but it’s a near thing. He just wants him to get to the fucking point already, warn him what he’s walking into with whatever’s wrong with Bucky. “Is he alright or did you make us rush back here for no reason?”

“Cool it, Captain Grumpypants, he’s fine. I just thought you should be… prepared for what she did.”

“I thought you said he was fine?” Steve accused, and they rounded the corner that lead them to the kitchens. From the hallway it all seems normal. No panic, no shouting, no blood splatters. There’s laughter and cutlery scraping plates and the smell of bacon sizzling in a pan reaches them before Sam sighs again, rubs his face and mutters something that sounds like “He’s fine alright.”

“She didn’t hurt him. He’s healthy, s’why we’re headed for lunch instead of gunning it to the medbay. But there was a fight, and a flash and… look, until we know who our sky-witch is and how to reverse her magic, we’re stuck with Frankie Valli over here.”

They walk into the kitchen and before Steve can officially Lose His Patience in a way that only he can, Bucky’s voice comes from his left and fills him with relief.

“Who’s Frankie Valli?”

Steve whips round and whatever he was about to say dies on his lips. That quick sensation of relief flits to shock, confusion, and settles on an uncomfortable mix of disbelief and arousal; the sight before him almost brings him to his knees.

Bucky is a fucking teenager.

He's is propped up on the kitchen counter, one leg up so he can rest a mixing bowl full of cereal upon it, the other swinging lazily as he chews. Gone is his metal arm, gone are years of scars and worry lines, even that deep crease on his forehead that’s become a permanent fixture from so much frowning and snarling. Gone is - never mind gone, it’s as though the last 80 or so years have been fucking _ wiped _from Bucky’s appearance, and before him is the Bucky he knew and loved (and pined after and fucked) as a teen. 

He’s perched on the granite worktop with all the airs and graces of someone who hasn’t spent the better part of a century as a brainwashed killing machine; shining brown hair tickles the back of his shoulders in waves, bright grey eyes twinkling beneath thick lashes, collarbones stark against the loose tanktop slipping down his shoulder - and Jesus Christ, is he wearing yoga pants? He’s lithe, vital, brimming with energy and brightness and an air of mischief that Steve hasn’t seen since 1938.

This isn’t the Bucky who left him three days ago to visit T’Challa, heavy with muscle and a life lived to its limits. This is the living image of what Bucky looked like as a wild 18 year old with his whole life ahead of him.

And Steve almost curls up with the sharp twist of arousal and need and utter _ want _ for him.

Not that he ever stopped being attracted to Bucky; with everything they’ve witnessed and lived through, Steve firmly believes in every alternative universe there will always be a Bucky and Steve, swearing to be together til the end of the line in one way or another. Never mind the red string of fate, they’re knotted and tangled and woven to eachother in ways that run deeper than attraction, than camaraderie, that no blade could slice and separate them. A fucking apocalypse event couldn’t even keep them apart. But that doesn’t stop Steve from cursing his eidetic memory for subjecting him to a crystal clear presentation of every expression Bucky’s face is capable of making at aged 18, how his voice could crack and whine when Steve first wrapped his lips around his cock in Winnie Barnes’ tiny kitchen at Thanksgiving at 2am, or how those long fingers looked digging into his hip as Bucky fucked frantically between Steve’s closed thighs on his birthday, with grime and oil from his day job at the mechanics under his nails and streaking across Steve’s shorts.

It stretches forever, his brain flipping from one image to the next like a dirty flickerbook, but realistically it’s only ten seconds or so until Steve realises he’s been standing at the kitchen door gaping at him.

Bucky raises an eyebrow, finishes his mouthful of cereal, and drawls in a voice that oozes youth and sensuality, “Cat got your tongue, Stevie?” Before he can reply (and god, he’s so painfully aware that he can’t even form words right now), Bucky wipes a droplet of milk from the curve of his bottom lip with his thumb - _ fuck, were his wrists really that tiny? _\- and dips it into his mouth, sucking the tip without breaking eye contact.

He barely swallows down the groan that tries to escape, and Sam leans in and mutters under his breath, “Yeah. _ That’s _why I won’t eat round him.”

Nat snickers and shakes her head as she gets up to rinse her mug. “Told you he’d love the yoga pants.”

“He hasn’t seen my ass in them yet.” She catches Bucky’s eye and he shrugs, going back to eating his cereal, dripping condensation from the mixing bowl on the offending yoga pants. Steve almost short circuits there and then. He gulps and does the mature, brave thing that a Captain leading the Avengers, who’s faced alien overlords and soldiers and overcame everything to get to where he is today would do: he takes a breath, and turns around to march right back to the elevator.

“You still haven’t told me who Frankie Valli is!” Bucky calls after him, and Steve jams the ‘Down’ button so hard he almost puts his thumb through it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After Steve has made his hasty exit, you bet your ass Clint backhands Sam's chest and snaps, "You called that a 'heads up'? You asshole. Even I want to fuck him."
> 
> (This will update intermittently; i have kids, pandemic, yadda yadda yadda.)


	3. 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Guilt Boners.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PLEASE NOTE: the rating for this fic has now changed, and may go up further as it progresses. Heed the tags, and check end notes for content warnings!

It’s not that Steve’s freaking out. He’s not. He’s fine, absolutely fine. It’s just that he’s hiding in an empty conference room on the first floor, self-flagellating and over thinking, ruminating his Guilt Boner, worrying about his boyfriend who’s upstairs right now who’s been magically de-aged after the idiot attacked a fucking witch and yet all he can think about his how much he wants to fuck him and -

Okay. Maybe he’s freaking out.

Look, the thing is Steve loves Bucky. Bucky loves Steve. That’s the long and short of it. That’s the way it’s always been, even if they didn’t always have words for it, and that’s the way it’ll always be. Sure, there’s been a few bumps in the road. What relationship hasn’t had that? And, yeah, maybe their obstacles are a little more...unconventional. If you can call almost dying multiple times, brainwashing, almost killing one another more than once, universal annihilation… yeah, unconventional. He’ll go with that. But at the end of the day, at the end of the line, he loves Bucky. Adores the bones of him. And in spite of all the years they’ve been apart - or because of them - they’re more in love than ever. And they fuck more than ever too, which is part of the reason Steve is hiding.

Bucky’s always managed to get under his skin without meaning to. It doesn’t take much; a lazy grin, a heated gaze, his warm hand brushing Steve’s hip as he passes him in the hall to go to the bathroom. It sets Steve’s nerves on fire and before long, they’re crashing against the nearest flat surface, grateful for the sound-proofed walls of their quarters. Bucky’s inexplicable ability to press Steve’s buttons is why this is even harder because he looks like _that_.

He scrubs his face and groans as he tries to rationalise it all in his head. There’s always been a certain… power dynamic, he supposes, in their relationship. Steve was always little compared to Bucky, even through their teen years, until he wasn’t. And before the Witch Incident they stood at a similar height thanks to their different strains of serum - hell, there was a point around the time of the shitshow in Berlin that Bucky was even bigger than him, bulked out and heavy and thick waisted. That was fun. Lots of fun. But there was a point in the last century or so, where Steve practically towered over him. He remembers balking during the Azzano rescue mission at how small Bucky had looked; starvation and sleep deprivation and torture does that to a guy, he supposes. Point is, for once the roles had reversed and Steve was big and Bucky was little and… christ, maybe that’s why this feels worse. At least back then Bucky had hard, work-hewn muscles and had slowly started to shoot up due to Zola’s experiments with the serum, so the difference wasn’t too startling for long. 

Now, though… now Steve is bigger than he had been in those days, his obscene body honed from years of training and fighting, and Bucky is even SMALLER. He doesn’t even have the calloused well-earned practical muscleature of a man who spends his days building and hammering like he had then. Now his body is lithe, soft, lean….and fuck, he’s just so tiny next to Steve. Delicate? No, that’s not it - that’s never been a word ascribed to Bucky Barnes, even when he’s wearing the body of his teenaged self. Breakable is more apt; Steve could break him, if he wanted. Innocent. Youthful. Guileless… Corruptible… 

Jesus fucking Christ, is that what this is? Some distorted, fucked up male fantasy where he could take what he wanted and Bucky couldn’t stop him? Is that why it’s so much more pronounced now than it was after Azzano? He remembers a time after they’d settled in at camp, before they’d shipped out to London, where they’d finally had a moment alone and, of course, spent it in eachother’s arms. It had been the first time in years Bucky had bottomed, and he’d been beautiful - back arched, wrists pinned under Steve’s new huge hands, choking back gasps and whines and muffled pleads for more into the cot pillow as Steve had fucked him into the thin mattress. 

That memory had kept them warm many a night they’d been on frozen missions in the mountains, but his mind starts to distort it. Bucky shrinks, his waist slimming, his shoulderblades stark on paler skin; his hair doesn’t stick up in short tufts, instead it snarls and tangles in dark waves around Steve’s fingers. His tiny ass bounces back on Steve’s cock and when he cries out his voice is pitched, breaking at the last second as he rips his face from where it’s buried in the pillow. His greedy little hole flutters and clenches around Steve’s thick cock and he can _feel_ it as he imagines it. Bucky’s face is sharper, unblemished and creamy, his long eyelashes wet with unshed tears, plumper lips stretched in an O of screaming pleasure as he comes untouched -

Steve stands so suddenly his chair topples back, the crash deafening in the empty conference room. These cyclical thoughts have been racing since he saw Bucky lounging on the counter top this morning, and he’s torn between chasing him down and fucking the life out of him, or submitting himself for psychiatric evaluation. What the fuck is wrong with him? He’s got the body of a teenager. A _teen_. Steve has the biological appearance of a man in his mid-thirties. This doesn’t feel right, and yet the more he tells himself this, the more he _wants_. What's wrong with him? Is it how taboo it feels? He doesn't know - he can barely think straight right now, and the Guilt Boner he's willing to disappear isn't helping. All he knows is he can't act on this - can't touch Bucky, can't ruin him the way he can feel himself getting desperate to, until this whole situation is smoothed out and Bucky is back to normal. 

He wonders, feeling sick for a moment: does this make him a predator? 

Shaking the intrusive thoughts from his brain like filthy etch-a-sketch, Steve devises a plan of action while he takes the stairs. First, he’ll shower and wash off the stink and sweat of last night’s mission. Then he’ll actually feed himself, because his stomach’s growling something fierce. Then… then he’ll face Bucky. Anything after that is blank, because normally they fuck eachother sensless after missions (moreso after Thanos; something about the fear of losing eachother again really gets to them and turns them desperate), but of course that makes him think of fucking Bucky in the body has now and -

No. Shower. Food. Bucky. _Talk_.

Yeah, he thinks as he slinks past the communal kitchens, hopefully avoiding detection from the remaining team members finishing breakfast. They should talk. He’ll think about what to say as he showers. He doesn’t know what, but he feels like he should own up to Bucky about how this is affecting him, how conflicted it’s leaving him. He owes him honesty, and he can give them that. And if Bucky is disgusted by how much Steve wants him in this new body, then so be it, he deserves the derision. He feels dirty, monstrous. And despite knowing it's his thoughts spiralling and his inability to reign them in that's making this a bigger deal than it should be, Steve feels like he's walking the green mile already.

There’s a near miss when he feels more than hears the tell-tale hum of Vision just as he reaches their private quarters, and Steve presses himself flat to the wall. The android doesn’t seem to have noticed him though, and phases through the wall and the floor below. Huh. At least he’s attempting doors, Steve thinks. Finally he slips through the doorway to their quarters and clicks it shut, leaning back against the cold wood with a heavy sigh. He chokes on it and it comes out as an unmanly squeak when he opens his eyes to see Bucky on the sectional sofa ahead of him, slim legs curled beneath him and arms folded across his chest. He’s glaring at Steve with such indignancy and intensity that any anxiety left in Steve’s body quickly bubbles and churns into uneasy arousal. 

“We gotta talk, Rogers.” Bucky says flatly.

Fucking Guilt Boners.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings:  
\- Steve fantasizes about fucking teenage Bucky. Though he's over 100 yrs old, his body still has the appearance of a late teen; rest assured it is at least 18 (we find out for sure next chapter!) so I have not added the tag for underage, but if this upsets you please keep these in mind.  
\- Steve worries about behaving in a predatory way.  
\- Smut; anal sex, not too graphic.
> 
> Basically, this is a chapter of Steve's chaotic/horny thought process. Next up: they finally talk!  
Any and all feedback welcome. Have a nice day!


End file.
